Wild Horse “Advocates” Fully to Blame for Deaths

My friend, Sue Wallis in Wyoming is part of United Organization of the Horse, an outfit doing battle against wild horse advocates. This is the organization that has been petitioning the U.S. government to re-open horse slaughter plants.  -Editor –

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Self-proclaimed wild horse “advocates” are fully to blame for the unnecessary and preventable deaths of horses during the Tuscarora wild horse gather.

 Wild horse litigation mills that continually bring obstructive and spurious court action to block the legally required management efforts of the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) to control the over-population of free roaming horses on public lands caused the death and unnecessary suffering of the very horses they are purporting to protect.

 First, court action delayed the planned start of the Tuscarora gather to the heat of the summer when water was already scarce on the range where there were more than 1,200 more horses in the Horse Management Areas (HMA) than the available forage and water could support.  The horses were already suffering and severely stressed from the lack of water. Then the advocate groups filed yet another temporary injunction, after the gather was already in progress. At that point, horses were dying on the range from lack of water, and so weakened they could not survive the transfer to feed and water.

 Even though these excess horses had been severely impacting adjourning ranch lands, compassionate ranchers worked with the BLM and voluntarily opened their fences to allow the horses to come to what water was still available. But the ranchers and the BLM were legally prevented from moving the horses because of the injunction, so they could not get them from where they were dying, to where they could drink. When finally the judge ruled on the side of common sense and compassion, sadly for far too many of the horses, it was already too late.

 It is time to stop the unmitigated damage caused by groups who make their living off of litigation. It is time for those who truly care about the well-being and sustainability of free-roaming horses, and every other living creature that depends on our public lands, to work together with the BLM to manage all animals and the land responsibly. We cannot allow well funded radical animal rights and environmental fringe groups to cause a multi-generational ecological disaster that will take hundreds of years and billions of dollars to repair, not to mention destroying the communities and the social fabric of the people who live and depend on the health of the land.

 It is time to stop the abuse being inflicted on the land, the animals, and the people through the courts. We have learned that many environmental groups are being fully funded by Equal Access to Justice Act Funds (EAJA) that use our tax dollars to litigate over everything, creating  horrific financial and emotional costs on private individuals and communities who are defenceless. One has to wonder if this same travesty is not being used as by so-called horse advocates and animal rights organizations. With no accountability of EAJA funds there is no way to tell.

 The United Organizations of the Horse and our tens of thousands of like-minded supporters across the West and the Nation join with a plethora of conservation organizations, wildlife organizations, true animal welfare (as opposed to animal rights) groups, groups advocating for the responsible management of public lands, local and state governments, tribes, communities and federal agencies charged with management of lands,  concerned citizens and horse lovers to stand with and assist the BLM in their charge to provide for a thriving ecological balance on Western public lands.

 Sue Wallis, Executive Director

United Organizations of the Horse

PO Box 71

Recluse, WY 82725